Joe Gunther pulled into a parking space and shivered slightly as both he and Kathy Bartlett emerged into the crisp fall air from their heated car. "You know what Harvey drives?" he asked, looking around the lot.
"No clue," she said grumpily, turning up her collar. Dan Harvey was her federal counterpart from the U.S. attorney's office in Burlington, and one of the two people they were hooking up with before meeting with Gabe Greenberg. The other was someone from Massachusetts neither of them knew, a Nick Kennedy, from the Essex County DA's office.
Having gotten directions earlier on how to proceed, Joe set out for a small gate cut into the chain-link fence.
This was not the entrance most visitors used. It was more discreet, and out of sight of the prison's general population. Meetings between inmates and prosecutors were not something the former liked witnessed by their brethren-it was an excellent way to be labeled a snitch and earn a proper pounding at the first opportunity. As a result, the Joe Gunthers of this world and their lawyerly associates had long ago opted for having such conversations off-site. Kathy didn't need her bargaining sessions hindered by the man opposite her checking over his shoulder every five minutes.
The brand-new Springfield facility had been built with that in mind, however, allowing her and Joe to enter and depart without undue notice. The decision to meet here, though, had been largely because of Harvey-he had the farthest to travel and the tightest schedule and, if things worked out, would have the least to do.
They met with both Harvey and Kennedy ten minutes later, after negotiating the prison's security, and then filed as a group into a closed, featureless room where Gabe Greenberg and his lawyer, a thin young man with a permanent scowl, named Randy Nichols, were already waiting.
Nichols smirked as they milled about taking off their coats, opening their briefcases, and choosing seats.
"No choir to back you up?" he asked.
Kathy Bartlett ignored him, making introductions instead. "Okay, Mr. Nichols," she finally said, "wisecracks aside, we're here both at your request and to show you that we're not blowing smoke up your skirt. The States of Mas-sachusetts and Vermont and the federal government are all on board with a death penalty case here, so what you're offering had better be good. We're ready to go to trial right now with what we've got."
Greenberg was sitting back in his chair, as unruffled as ever, looking like a bored accountant, despite the nature of Kathy's comments. By contrast, Nichols leaned his elbows on the table, his expression darkening. "I want assurances that the death penalty not only disappears, but that the whole federal route does, too." He pointed at Harvey and Kennedy in turn. "This becomes a Vermont case only."
Kathy smiled, not bothering to glance at the other two attorneys, having anticipated this demand earlier. "Any deal depends on what you tell Special Agent Gunther here. You ready for that conversation?"
Greenberg stirred himself enough to whisper into Nichols's ear.
"All right," the attorney conceded.
"Great," Kathy said brightly, rising to her feet, as did the mute Harvey and Kennedy. "We'll be outside."
Joe waited until the three of them had filed out so he could begin the next phase of the minuet. Absurd as it sounded, just as it was necessary for all three legal entities to be present today, it was just as important that none of them fall into the trap of becoming a defense witness because of anything Greenberg might reveal in person. The job of listening to Greenberg fell to Joe alone.
"What've you got, Gabe?" he asked after the door had closed.
Greenberg didn't mince words or waste time. "I did Shriver and the guy in Gloucester on orders from Tom Bander."
Joe kept his voice flat. "How and when did this happen?"
But Greenberg demurred. "That's it. You want more-which I have-I want assurances from the three kings out there."
Joe frowned. A lifetime of dealing with such people had still not immunized him from the outrage he felt at their behavior. That sense of double entitlement-allowing them to kill and then manipulate the system-still infuriated him. "What about Katie Clark?" he asked, exacting a surprised look from Nichols, who clearly hadn't heard the name before.
Greenberg stared at him long enough for Joe to see the cold-bloodedness behind the man's bland exterior. "Never heard of her."
Reluctantly, Joe pushed his chair back. He didn't believe that for a moment, but he could clearly do nothing about it. His irritation, however, did prompt him to ask, "I don't suppose Bander told you why he wanted them dead?"
It was a long shot, not one he thought would stimulate a response, so he was halfway to his feet when Greenberg answered, "He said they had the goods on him for a job he'd pulled when he was starting out-a store robbery where some old guy died."
Joe stared at him, the shadowy figure of Tom Bander finally secured to a reality that made some sense. All this time the man had floated by in conversations with the substance of smoke. Now, at last, he had a pedigree Joe could grab hold of, straight from the proverbial horse's mouth.
"Did that come as a surprise?" he asked on impulse. "That your boss had that kind of background?"
Nichols looked confused while Greenberg merely seemed amused. "He's a businessman," he said. "Of course he's a crook."
That was too pat-and explained nothing. Joe straightened, moved toward the door, and tried again. "Did he say he was the one who killed the store owner?
"Not in so many words."
Joe nodded. Naturally. He grabbed the doorknob and said, "Okay. Be right back."
In the outer room, the three attorneys faced him as he entered.
"He deal?" Kathy asked.
Joe nodded, still torn by his conflicting emotions. Greenberg's parting words had fulfilled all of Gunther's needs. To secure a nontestimonial court order for a DNA sample, all that was needed was something called "an articulable suspicion" that a crime had been committed. What Joe had now was in the suburbs of probable cause-far sturdier ground and a reason for true celebration. Except that now that he was closing in at last on his own personal Holy Grail, he had to wonder what might happen next.
"Yup," he told her. "He's giving up Bander, complete with motive."
Thomas Bander lived outside Brattleboro in an upscale neighborhood called Hillwinds. For the most part, the houses here hovered between upper middle class and the slumming wealthy, depending on whether the section was freshly developed or dated back twenty years, since Hillwinds continued to spread slowly like a living ink blot. Not surprisingly, Bander's house was off the beaten path, up a long driveway, and secure behind a stone wall and an iron fence-unusual affectations for an area that prided itself on being neighborly, if slightly a cut above.
In a roundabout fashion, the trip here had taken several days, even though, as the crow flies, the VBI office was barely ten miles distant. That was testimony to the lawyer's art, since the delay was due entirely to that.
Getting the nontestimonial court order had been as simple as expected. Getting Bander to comply had involved a series of grandstanding maneuvers by his attorney, including a press conference in which the police were accused of hounding a poor innocent man to distraction. As a compromise to Bander's delicate disposition, the order was going to be met, but only discreetly, at his residence, and would involve only a bare minimum of police officers.
In fact, there had also been a bit of back-and-forth on the prosecutorial side of the equation. What Greenberg had given Kathy Bartlett was actually enough to generate an arrest warrant for Bander, rather than a mere nontestimonial order. But just barely. As a result, Bartlett was in no mood to let a fish this size strategize after being prematurely slapped with a double murder charge. She far preferred to let him swim while she accumulated as much damning evidence as possible.
By the same token, and to stretch the metaphor, she wasn't beyond giving the line a yank or two to remind Bander of his position. Joe's desire for a DNA sample fit in nicely there. Her earlier proposal, that he not secure the sample surreptitiously, but hit Bander straight on, had now grown to a tactical gambit.
"Jeez," Sammie Martens said as Joe turned the last curve in the long driveway and came within view of the house. "I didn't know places like this even existed in Vermont."
"They exist," Joe told her. "You just can't see them from the road."
"Too bad," she murmured, craning to take it all in.
It was enormous: multistoried, shingle-clad, wrapped in a porch, and crested with beautiful eyebrow windows and complicated woodwork along a vast roofline. It was less than twenty years old-Joe remembered hearing about its construction at the time-but it had been built as an Adirondack throwback, albeit with modern trimmings.
They rolled to a stop by an expanse of porch steps leading up to a huge front door and got out of the car, their shoes crunching on the pea-size stones of the drive.
Joe gestured to Sam to precede him, bowing slightly.
She smiled. "Thank you, sir. It does sort of set a mood, don't it?"
"It do." He smiled back.
The levity died as they reached the top. Across the broad width of the porch the door opened, and Walter Masius III, Tom Bander's lawyer, stood before them in a three-piece suit with his telegenic mane of white hair. An unknown entity to Joe until Bander's appearance in this case, Masius had become its media darling in a scant few days-eloquent, dramatic, charismatic, and eminently quotable. The press had taken him to their hearts.
Sam couldn't stand the man.
"Hey, Counselor," she greeted him. "They let you in, too?"
Masius smiled broadly. "Indeed they did, Agent Martens." He nodded graciously at Joe. "Agent Gunther, how are you today?"
"Impatient. Where is he?"
Masius stepped aside and ushered them in. "Mr. Bander's in the library."
"You sound like the butler," Sam commented.
But Masius was beyond such taunts. He merely gestured down a ballroom-size hallway. The man could afford a thick skin, Gunther thought, his footsteps lost in the softness of thick carpeting. Boston-based, with a who's-who list of shifty, well-heeled clients, Walter Masius hadn't achieved his stardom by being easily riled.
He passed ahead of them about halfway down the hall and opened a tall, carved wooden door to their left. "In here," he said, and again stood aside to let them in.
The room they entered was two stories high, with one wall of leaded-glass windows and the other three lined with solid rows of expensive books. A railed balcony ran above them like a suspended horseshoe. Persian rugs were scattered across the floor, fat leather furniture was gathered in clusters around old-looking lamps and low, claw-footed tables, and by the windows sat a desk, huge as a dry-docked aircraft carrier.
The whole room was as sumptuous as a movie set and looked just as fake. Gunther had no doubt that the entire collection of books had been purchased by an interior decorator and remained untouched by the home's owner.
"Mr. Bander will be right in," Masius purred. "Make yourselves comfortable." He backed out, drawing the door closed as he went.
"Christ," Sam said in a whisper, looking around.
"It's a My Fair Lady knockoff," Joe told her. "I've seen it before, only better." He sighed in frustration. "I knew he'd pull this kind of crap-soon as I heard we had to come here to collect. Goddamned theatrics."
Sam watched her boss walk over to the windows and stare out at the vast lawn, its surface flecked with dead leaves, pale and battered by the first frosts of the season. She'd seen him get increasingly tense as the days had crawled by, sitting far from the command post in his upstairs office, poring over files he'd studied a dozen times already. The contrast between that and their own progress downstairs had been palpable, since they'd been successfully strengthening their case against Greenberg with ever-growing piles of evidence, including having located his three colleagues from the Tunbridge Fair. Knowing that they were all involved in a major case was intoxicating, which only made Sam's awareness of Joe's isolation that much more poignant. Several times she'd found excuses to drop by to find out how he was doing, and each time, although he'd pretended to be working, she'd known he'd simply been waiting for today-for the evidence, true, but even more, she sensed, for the opportunity to bring a little peace to his spirit.
A different door, off to one side and designed to blend into the bookcases, opened to reveal the man they'd both seen only in news photos, on TV, and as a scruffy youngster in yellowed mug shots.
Walter Masius was on his heels, still acting like a windup majordomo.
"Mr. Bander, Agents Gunther and Martens."
Seeing his nemesis for the first time in person-a short, pale, unprepossessing man dressed in nondescript clothes-caught Joe unexpectedly. In a way, he'd anticipated something weightier, at least marginally dramatic-someone looking the role ascribed to him.
This was a nobody, a delivery man lost in a mansion, glancing around as if expecting to be thrown out.
Joe knew what Thomas Bander had done, both as T. J. Ralpher and under the guise of legitimate business. He knew that underneath the insipid exterior hid a man capable of ruthless cruelty.
But therein lay the distinction between what Joe had imagined and what faced him now-previously, Bander's evil had been shrouded with a convenient, though fictionalized, personality. Call it the spider of lore at the web's center, calculating, seductive, lethally larger than life-a monster deserving of the damage that Joe had carried around inside him for well over half his years.
But now, in this forgettable, unmemorable, utterly ordinary man, Joe suddenly saw the larger insult of simple amorality. Tom Bander was no dark creature. He was simply an opportunistic parasite.
"You can cut the crap, Masius," Gunther said shortly from across the large room, feeling the heat of pure rage wash over him. "This isn't Masterpiece Theatre, and you're not Alistair Cooke. Let's get this done." He waved at his colleague impatiently. "Sam."
Sam looked at him, startled, as she reached into her pocket to extract the small buccal swab kit needed for the sampling. She could count on one hand the times she'd seen Joe angry, always in response to an immediate crisis-never a real burn like this one.
She approached the slight man with Masius. "Mr. Bander? Sorry, but I need to confirm your identity before taking the swab."
Masius spoke for his client. "We attest that this is Thomas Bander, for the record."
"Driver's license," Joe said, still keeping his distance.
"I don't believe that's necessary," Masius stated dismissively. "My client is a well-known member of the community."
Gunther's voice remained hard. "It's a court order, goddamn it. Show her the license."
Masius opened his mouth to respond, but Bander merely extracted his wallet and displayed the ID. Sam peered at the photograph and nodded, handing Masius a copy of the judge's order.
"You want to sit down for this?" she asked Bander.
He smiled slightly. "Will it hurt?"
Joe suddenly broke from his position, crossed the carpeting quickly, and seized Bander by the upper arm as everyone, Sam included, tensed for a violent outburst. Instead, Gunther roughly drew him to a chair and sat him down like a child.
"Open your mouth," he ordered.
"Now, just a minute," Masius objected.
Joe turned on him. "You shut up."
Bander was looking up, from one to the other.
Gunther refocused on him. "Was there something you didn't understand?"
His mouth snapped open.
Sam moved around her boss, quickly slipped on a pair of latex gloves, and extracted the swab from its sealed envelope. The sooner they left, she hoped, the sooner she'd be able to prevent Joe from shooting someone.
"I'm sorry, Agent Gunther," Masius intoned, "But I'm going to have to take this up with your superiors. This is simply not acceptable behavior."
Joe took three fast steps toward him, forcing him to retreat until he bumped into the wall.
"You call anybody you like, Counselor. I don't happen to give a good goddamn. But while I'm here, doing what the law allows, I am not going to put up with your shit. Is that understood?"
"I will not…," the other man began.
"Is that understood?" Gunther shouted, his face two inches from the lawyer's.
Masius paused, swallowed, and finally murmured, "Yes."
Gunther returned to Bander, who was licking his lips following Sam's careful swiping of both his inner cheeks with the buccal swab, which she was now repackaging at high speed.
"And you, T. J.," he said, leaning forward and emphasizing Bander's former name, "you better enjoy your last days in this place, 'cause your ass is mine. After all these years getting rich off other people's misery, you're in for some serious payback."
"Okay, boss," Sam said very quietly. "I'm all set."
Gunther nodded and was heading for the door when Masius spoke up again.
Sam didn't hear what he said. Joe whirled around so fast and shouted, "Don't" so loudly, his finger pointed like a sword at the man, that only that one word reverberated around them.
Once again, Masius shut his mouth, his eyes narrow with anger.
Sam and Joe left the room-and the house-in total silence.
Used to weathering a lifetime of male outbursts, Sam made directly for the car, trusting time to settle Joe back down.
But he stayed standing at the bottom of the porch's broad steps for a moment, his head back, seemingly taking in the cold, overcast sky.
She hesitated by the car door, wondering whether to get in and wait, or stay where she was. When Willy acted out, it was so routine and she was so used to it, she rarely gave it a second's thought. It was one of the tricks of their unusual relationship that she had this knack, and thus the ability to keep them going as a couple.
But she was off balance here and unsure of how to behave. She finally decided to do nothing and merely stood stock-still, her hand resting on the car's fender.
As if suddenly losing air from within, Joe dropped his head, slumped his shoulders, and let out a long sigh. He then walked over to the car and brought his fist down on its hood with a crash, leaving a rock-size divot. All without uttering a word.
Sam glanced at the dent along with him for a slow count of five.
"Feel better?" she risked asking.
Almost reluctantly, he brought his eyes up to meet hers. "My hand hurts."
"Bad?"
He flexed his fingers. "No."
She tilted her head inquiringly to one side. "You want to get out of here before they hassle us for trespassing?"
He looked at the huge building with a contemptuous frown. "Right."
She waited until they'd regained the Upper Dummerston Road, off Hillwinds, before commenting, "This case must be taking its toll."
He laughed, to her relief, and admitted, "You noticed that, huh? Good investigator."
"You pick up on the little things," she said. "It's like an art."
He didn't answer for quite a while, his eyes on the road ahead, before adding, "Or a migraine."
"You're not happy about nailing this guy?" she asked.
He mulled that over. "Not really. I mean, I recognize the value of it, but it's too late. It won't repair the damage."
He glanced at her, allowing her a glimpse of unmitigated sadness and loss.
"It's been too long," he added. "And it's cut too deep."